About Me

I truly believe I am the luckiest girl in the world. At 23 years old, I've had more life-changing experiences than most do in an entire lifetime. From sailing around the world to dancing down Main Street USA, I have to wonder how this is all real.

What's Next?

For the first time in a while, I'm not really sure where my life is headed. I'll be heading to Florida after graduation to continue working for Disney, but in terms of major plans, all I know is that I want to make a difference. I'm not sure where, and I'm not sure how, but unknowing adventure is an idea I've definitely become more comfortable with over the years.

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Sunday, October 21, 2012

It may have been 6 months ago that I was in Hong Kong, but I made a promise to myself to eventually blog about my last few port experiences, so here I am with round one. And while I may not remember the play-by-play of each minute, I still think I can do a pretty good job of summing up my experiences.

Introductory notes about Hong Kong:
Hong Kong is a territory of China yes, but it is completely, completely different culturally, economically, geographically and historically. It returned to Chinese rule after being under the British in 1997, and as part of the deal, Hong Kong was able to retain its own government, banking and other features for 50 years. So Hong Kong has its own dollar, is not a communist government, and speaks both English and Mandarin. Also, where as there are many restrictions on freedoms in mainland China, Hong Kong is a lot more lax. We were able to access facebook and other sites that would not be allowed on the mainland and were able to more easily navigate because of the more open culture. The infrastructure is extremely different and it is also much more technologically advanced. So when reading this, keep in mind that Hong Kong, although technically part of China, was in fact a port all its own.

We arrived in Hong Kong on April 1st. Upon going through immigration on the ship, Michael, Dain and I went out exploring while we could as there were FDPs that afternoon for Michael and Dain. Our ship was docked in an extraordinary location. Unlike previous ports where we were generally in industrial zones (with the exception of Singapore), we were in the heart of the city, surrounded by the glamour that is the Hong Kong skyline. Upon getting off the ship, many of the SAS students headed immediately to the Starbucks that was right by our port (first starbucks we saw in months - this made some of us quite happy). However, we had more important things to do and after a quick stop at an ATM for some cash (Hong Kong Dollars are SO COOL looking!) we boarded the ferryboat to take us across the island to the other side of the city. We probably only walked 30 feet before Dain and Michael suddenly had this glow in their eye that I knew had to come from something in nerd-heaven, and, lo-and-behold, I turn around to see a two floor Apple store with with clear glass walls and an amazing spiral staircase connecting the floors. Needless to say, we ended up spending basically our whole morning in the Apple store, checking out the "new" IPad (well, it was new to us), checking in on our facebooks and all-in-all just reconnecting with the real world. There were probably 100 other SAS-ers in the store too, clearly a popular destination.

After our Apple adventure we briefly walked a little further but shortly turned back around and headed back to the ship. When we boarded the ship we ate lunch on deck 6 aft outdoors and then I went downstairs with Dain to help him pack before his FDP. Of course, Dain being Dain hadn't started packing despite that we were leaving for Disneyland immediately upon his return, so while he left for his FDP I was left on the ship packing for him (thank god one of us is on top of things). Honestly, I didn't finish until shortly before he returned so after that I just stayed on the ship and relaxed for a little while. I would have loved to been adventuring in port, but alas, what could I do?

When Dain returned we went up to eat dinner on the ship and then grabbed our stuff and headed out to Disneyland! We were able to see the Hong Kong light show on the way out, which is basically a show put on in the skyline by all of the lights from the buildings, and then we were off! It took a series of 4 trains after getting off the ferry to make it there, in addition to a lot of rushing through streets that we had trouble navigating, but eventually we made it to Sunny Station, which was where we would board the exclusive purple train that traveling solely between that station and the Disneyland station. When the we got to the Disneyland track, the train was already there, and our jaws just dropped. The train had Mickey Ears for windows, and when we stepped on it was completely Disney-fied. Instead of regular train seats, there were red couches. Between couches were cases with Disney memorabilia and pictures of Walt. The handrails were Mickey-themed and the speakers were playing Disney songs! Both of us being Disney cast members, we were definitely missing the magic of Mickey and this was a great start to our trip!

When we got to the station, we were at first a little bit confused because the station is themed to be like a dim-lit park and it was unlike anything Disney we had seen before. But we made it up the ramp and saw the sign that said "Hong Kong Disneyland" and the grins across our faces couldn't have been brighter. We were here!!!!!! Hong Kong Disneyland isn't anything like the Walt Disney World Resort. Instead of being this whole world. Hong Kong is 2 resorts and 1 theme park - with nothing like a Downtown Disney or extra attractions. So we found our way to the bus line and waited for our ride to Disney's Hollywood Hotel. When our bus pulled up, it was Toy Story themed, as Hong Kong is home to Toy Story Land! We were so, so excited!

The bus first stopped at The Hong Kong Disneyland Hotel, the other (and more expensive) hotel on property, and then traveled to the Hollywood Hotel. We checked in and were walking to the elevator and not only do we pass "Chef Mickey's Restaurant" and I start jumping for joy but we see DONALD DUCK IN THE LOBBY!! I literally threw my bags down and ran like a child just absolutely ecstatic to see my long lost ducky! When it was our turn I hugged that poor duck so tight that I probably hurt his big belly! I whispered to him "Donald, you and I are friends in Florida" and Donald got SO excited! I was being a complete tourist, which is everything Semester at Sea is not about, but at that time I didn't give a damn. I saw my Donald for the first time in months and gosh was it amazing!!

After Donald, we made it to the elevator (which had Mickey ears for buttons) and went to our room. Our room was amazingly beautiful and the bathroom-provided amentities were given to us in a Mickey cup ANDDDDD THE SHAMPOO BOTTLES HAD MICKEY EARS FOR TOPS. Dain and I being the complete nerds we are were so freaking excited we couldn't take it. We dropped our bags and went to explore the resort.

We went into the gift shop where I pretty much started making a mental list of the things I would "need" to buy the next day, walked along the pool (which wasn't mickey shaped :( but did have the coolest entrance way ever which was just a waterfall you had to walk under [there was also a less cool "dry" entrance]), checked out the scenery display of 1930s California, took pictures in front of the "Hollywood Hotel" sign, went into the quick service place and got Mickey premium bars (!!!!) and Pooh-shaped Muffins (for Dain, obviously) and then used their computers to obviously and necessarily check-in to Hong Kong Disneyland on Facebook. After our adventures (which were a lot longer than the three sentences I made them out to be) we went upstairs to our room and watched Disney cartoons! They actually had three of each channel - one in Cantonese, one in Mandarin and one in English so it was perfect and so much fun!

We woke up super early the next morning so we could check out the other hotel before the park opened at 10am. The Hong Kong Disneyland hotel is basically the Hong Kong counterpart of The Grand Floridian and Grand Californian, and was no less gorgeous. The coolest thing was probably the giant hedge maze they had in the back of the resort! Extremely fun! We headed back to the Hollywood Hotel around 8:00am to meet our friend Kathryn who would be joining us for the rest of the trip, but we actually ended up finding her in the lobby of the Disneyland Hotel because she went to the wrong place! What great timing though since none of us had cell phones! We took her back to drop off her things and then got on the bus to the park. At the entrance, we met up with Grace and Sarah and went to go buy our tickets! Seeing Main Street from the line was making me so giggly but anxious, and the line moved way too slow for our liking, but eventually we made it in the park and were ready to go!

Long story short, Hong Kong Disneyland is the smallest of all Disney parks across the globe but to me that didn't make it any less magical and we still couldn't finish the entire park in a day. A lot of the attractions are similar or identical to a US counterpart, but there were still some unique ones. Here are some highlights:
-Main Street USA. Yes, its basically the same Main Street as Disneyland and Magic Kingdom, but walking down something USA themed in Hong Kong is pretty cool.
-Stitch's attraction which I forget the name of. It was basically and interactive thing like Turtle Talk with Crush, but what I loved about it was that they offered different languages at different times of day so we were able to see a show in English! And Sarah was picked to be Stitch's "girlfriend!"
-Flights of Fantasy Parade. This is a very similar parade to Disneyland's Soundsational and was just as breathtaking, with amazing floats and a great soundtrack. Donald's float even stopped right in front of us!
-The Golden Mickey's. "The Golden Mickey's" is a show that originated on Disney Cruise Line and has found a permanent home in Hong Kong. While the dialog was in Cantonese there were screens with English subtitles and the songs were in English. We loved it!
-It's A Small World. It's a lot different going on It's A Small World when you are in the midst of sailing around it. It really is that small. Plus, we all thought it was hysterical that in the cue line there was a pretty long spiel given in Chinese and then all they said in the English translation was "welcome to it's a small world," which was clearly nothing along the lines of what they said in their 2-minute Mandarin spiel.
-Toy Story Land. Toy Story Land doesn't exist in the US parks so this was a complete must do for us! We rode RC Racer, took a whole lot of pictures, got "American" food (NACHOS FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THREE MONTHS = OMG ITS NOT GRILLED CHICKEN AND POTATOS ITS SO GOOD IM GONNA DIE).
-Our way out. On our way out we ran into another group of SASers that were at the park for the day and so we decided to all take a picture in front of Sleeping Beauty's castle. So Dain set up his juggernaut of a tripod and we all got together and started doing different poses, like Mickey ears, and jumping, and excited and so on. Basically, how this was memorable is because we ended up having our own paparazzi with at least 30-40 guests of Chinese origins taking pictures of us taking pictures! It was great!

After an amazing day at the park we went back to the hotel where I spent an ungodly amount of money buying stuff (I actually brought an empty duffle bag from the ship with me to fill with things I would inevitable buy and it still didn't all fit), and then went to bed to head to the airport in the morning.